


fireproof

by isaksara (syailendra)



Series: Atsumu + Sakusa + The National = ? [3]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Law Enforcement, Blood and Violence, M/M, thief atsumu joins agent sakusa. they fight crime
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:41:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23540020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/syailendra/pseuds/isaksara
Summary: This time, when Kiyoomi slams him again—back-first—against his dinner table, he pushes the sharp edge of his knife against the intruder’s throat as a deterrent against any sudden movements.“Holy shit, relax! I’m tryin’ to turn myself in, Omi-kun!”SakuAtsu Week Day 3:You are not the only one to sit awake until the wild feelings leave.(Fireproof)
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi, background OsaSuna, onesided HiruAtsu
Series: Atsumu + Sakusa + The National = ? [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1691503
Comments: 9
Kudos: 403
Collections: SakuAtsu Week 2020





	fireproof

**Author's Note:**

> with MANY, many apologies to hirugami fukurou. hashtag do it for the drama. also i am just straight up using the song title now, (Fireproof by The National) because i have given up, apparently
> 
> there is some violent stuff here involving people getting beaten up and stabbed. if you would rather skip that, you can stop at _Now the rough flooring tears at Atsumu’s cheek_ and skip to _“Ya didn’t have ta do that,” he croaks out._

_You are not the only one to sit awake until the wild feelings leave._

* * *

“No.”

It’s the response Atsumu has hoped for, in a traitorous fluttering corner of his heart. It is not the one he wants, nor is it the one he needs. He hadn’t even really expected it of Sakusa. Atsumu leans forward at the desk, watching Sakusa’s brows furrow. He has very emotive eyebrows—a source of amusement for Atsumu under ordinary circumstances. 

“It’s your best shot. Ya won’t get another chance like this in years, Omi-kun.”

“You’re telling us to serve you on a plate to _Hirugami Fukurou_ , the man who’s been sending Komori body parts for years. Without backup. With only the microchips in your earrings.” Atsumu is about to protest, but Sakusa continues before he can say anything else. “Yes, I know he doesn’t suspect you of anything. No, I don’t want to hear about how long he’s been infatuated with you. If he figures you out, not only will you not come out of it alive, but dying won’t even be the worst thing that will happen to you.”

“It’s our best shot,” Atsumu says quietly, “at saving Osamu.”

Sakusa doesn’t say anything in reply to that.

“Komori already approved, so there’s nothing you can do about it anyway. I’m just tellin’ ya. As a matter of courtesy.”

Atsumu doesn’t really know what he’s doing here. He knows there’s no point in telling Sakusa himself, because Komori’s still in charge of this case and would have told him anyway. He knew Sakusa wouldn’t change Atsumu’s mind or have any alternatives. He’d walked into Sakusa’s office fifteen minutes ago just to watch the man’s grip tighten a little bit on his pen as he breathes out now, the air rattling through him. Atsumu always did like to get under Sakusa’s skin.

“Fine. Is there anything else?”

“Nothin’. Well, I’ve gotta go meet up with Komori again now. See ya ‘round.” He gets up and turns. Maybe, finally, Sakusa will reach for him, brush his gloved fingers against Atsumu’s arm.

He doesn’t.

“You’re too valuable to lose,” Sakusa says behind him.

Atsumu wants to turn around and demand him to elaborate. Sakusa is most probably still speaking on behalf of the Bureau here, but if Atsumu’s climbing into a plane and signing up to be a kamikaze pilot he’s allowed his little delusions. So he doesn’t turn, and he can think what he likes about Sakusa’s words.

“Yeah? That sounds like a you problem,” he replies instead, then walks out and closes the door behind him.

* * *

When Kiyoomi drives to work on Tuesday, he runs into three red lights. Not being a superstitious man, he thinks nothing of this, as he thinks nothing of the crack he steps on when he walks on the sidewalk to get to the side door. The first sign of misfortune he forces himself to recognize is Komori, who hurtles down the corridor at a frankly unacceptable speed at him. It is eight a.m. There is no reason for Komori to be this excited unless Hirugami has wrapped himself up in a Tiffany blue bow and parked his criminal self at Komori’s desk.

Komori is biting his lip like he’s trying to stifle a huge grin. He is quite obviously failing.

“Good morning, Sakusa! There’s a gift for you in your office.” He gets behind Kiyoomi and starts pushing him towards the door of his office, never mind that Kiyoomi was headed there anyway and—with Komori being six inches shorter than him—this looks extremely ridiculous. A junior agent is blatantly staring. “I got it inspected already and everything. Completely safe. One hundred percent. You just have to see it.”

“The sender?”

Komori stops attempting to push him and giggles as he starts to walk in front of him instead. Kiyoomi has seen this man take on five armed mercenaries at once, and yet he has the threatening aura of a beagle rolling belly-up in a meadow. “See, that’s why you have to see it.”

The box on Kiyoomi’s desk is huge. It is the color of the pale part of a caramel pudding, with slightly darker printed vines snaking up the sides. Kiyoomi glances at Komori, who nods excitedly. At first Kiyoomi isn’t sure what he’s looking at when he opens the box. Behind him, Komori is urging him to take it out, so Kiyoomi does.

The fabric spills over his arm in a flood of burgundy velvet. Gold threads spread like branches with jeweled flowers hanging on them, sparkling mutedly as Kiyoomi moves closer to the window. He stretches it out. It’s a coat, cut almost normally but for the extravagant stretch of velvet that goes beyond any human man’s height. He looks again in the box.

There is a pair of darker gloves, patterned with the same gold thread. Three layers of crystals circle the wrists and individual ones mark the fingers. Next to it lies a jet black card.

In golden type, it says: _I don’t think they’ve noticed that this is missing, so you’ll have to break the news, Omi-kun. See you at the Azumane exhibition’s opening night! Here’s a nice little preview for you. I hope to see you wearing them when you come to arrest me. Although we both know you’ll fail to do that, I won’t mind the eye candy. Yours,_ _Night Fox_. 

There is a tiny drawing of a fox on the corner. Kiyoomi knows it all too well. He curses the day he’d decided to ask for this goddamned case. It had been exciting, at first, because of his adversary’s intelligence and the relatively casualty-free nature of their encounters. Evidently the Night Fox had shared the same opinion, then proceeded to do his utmost to become the bane of Kiyoomi’s existence.

“What are you waiting for? Try it on.”

“This is evidence, Komori.”

“This is a gift from the Night Fox. Come on, come on, humor me. I’ll lock the door and everything so no one’s going to walk in on you putting it on.”

Kiyoomi sighs. If he doesn’t do this, Komori won’t leave him alone for the entire week. He might try to sneak up on Kiyoomi and put it on in front of everyone, which would be even worse.

“Fine, but no pictures.”

“Done.”

Komori locks the door as promised. Kiyoomi puts on the coat. The gloves are a tight fit over his own regular gloves, but he manages. Then Komori makes him turn around three times. He takes no pictures, presumably because he’s keenly aware of what Kiyoomi can do with sufficient cause and a ballpoint pen.

“That looks great, Sakusa. The Night Fox has taste,” Komori gasps. Kiyoomi glares at him, but Komori only smiles back sunnily.

As the Night Fox predicts, Kiyoomi fails to catch him at the opening night of the Azumane exhibition. He does, however, prevent the theft of all the other items of the collection, and manages to almost subdue the Night Fox in a scuffle before the sneaky bastard pulls a knife out of nowhere and jams it into the wall a hair’s breadth away from Kiyoomi’s throat, startling him and giving the Fox time to escape.

“I’m disappointed, Omi-kun,” the Fox calls out when he’s out of sight. Kiyoomi turns every way to catch where his voice is coming from. He runs in that direction. “I really wanted ta see ya in that outfit!”

The coat and the gloves show up in a magazine spread Komori leaves on his desk the next week. Kiyoomi burns it.

* * *

Hirugami Fukurou would be a very attractive man if it wasn’t for the unfortunate choice of facial hair and the body count. But then he would be his younger brother, and Atsumu knows all about not wanting to be interchangeable with your sibling. Today they talk about this for a while before Hirugami plucks a grape from its cluster and Atsumu, making the effort to be perceptive, opens his mouth so Hirugami can feed it to him.

“I hear you’ve been inactive lately,” Hirugami says as Atsumu swallows. His gaze follows the motion of Atsumu’s throat. “The game’s losing its lustre?”

Atsumu makes a thoughtful face for Hirugami’s benefit. Audience aside, he never says no to a bit of preening, and the outfits Hirugami lends him here—long satin robes that flow like water, silk shirts made to be unbuttoned—certainly don’t hurt. “Nah. Was just thinkin’ maybe Osamu had the right idea, so I was trying out the quiet life until your invitation came. That, I just couldn’t resist.”

“You always did have a wiser twin. Maybe that’s why I like you more.”

He says this like he’s not pointing a metaphorical loaded gun at Osamu to keep Suna on a leash. Of course he doesn’t know that Atsumu knows, but the audacity involved—it’s standard-issue in this world, but after being around Komori and Sakusa for a year it blindsides Atsumu. Still, he should be used to Hirugami’s particular brand of communication. Most days are spent like this, with Hirugami speaking in low, melodic tones as Atsumu helps him plan the theft of just about a few hundred million dollars’ worth of treasures from the British royal family.

If Hirugami touches him, brushing his arm against Atsumu’s, Atsumu goes to sleep thinking of what will happen after all of this is over. It’s an old dream with some new adjustments. He will retire to a beautiful house in the country, taking all the loveliest things he's ever pilfered with him: the lacquered vases, the flowing folds of godly robes carved from marble, the cascades of gold and lapis lazuli. He will arrange them so that the light of the sun will wash over them in the morning, set them ablaze in the afternoon. Life can be lived just observing such beauty. Atsumu will content himself with watching until he rots.

When he closes his eyes and imagines this, he finds Sakusa Kiyoomi near the jewelry, turning from golden chains to walk towards Atsumu. His gloves are still on. Atsumu would never ask him to take them off. Sometimes Atsumu will glimpse tiny slivers of his wrists when he moves them in his strange ways. Look, but don’t touch.

This is the only instance in which Atsumu will follow this rule.

* * *

One second Kiyoomi is drying his dishes with a cloth and no one else is in his apartment; the next, Kiyoomi has put his plates in their cabinet and there is someone else in his apartment. He doesn’t know what it is that alerts him of this fact, only that it exists. Instinct, perhaps, from years of work. Kiyoomi goes for the knife at his belt. Better not shoot and risk stray bullets hitting his neighbors.

The assailant is faster than him. Kiyoomi registers this as the man rushes at him, but Kiyoomi is stronger, slamming the man against the table in hopes of stunning him. It doesn’t work. He jumps back up and lunges at Kiyoomi, who dodges and swings, just as the man ducks out of the way, kicking at Kiyoomi so he’s forced to move near his sink. Near the washed dishes. If they break, Kiyoomi is going to be _extremely_ pissed off.

From his movements, the intruder doesn’t seem armed, but Kiyoomi will chance having to take the intruder to the ER over getting shot because he didn’t anticipate it. He swings the knife. The intruder grabs his arm and uses his momentum to spin Kiyoomi’s body, and suddenly he can’t move his hands. The intruder has _handcuffed_ him to the bar Kiyoomi uses to hang his dishtowel in less than a second, proceeding to step backward gingerly like he’s facing a tiger.

Kiyoomi bends his wrists. He frees his hands. The man startles, but it’s too late.

This time, when Kiyoomi slams him again—back-first—against his dinner table, he pushes the sharp edge of his knife against the intruder’s throat as a deterrent against any sudden movements.

“Holy shit, relax! I’m tryin’ to turn myself in, Omi-kun!”

Of course, out of all the possible culprits in the world, the one who interrupts Kiyoomi as he’s about to return his dishes to their proper places would be the fucking Night Fox.

“You have a funny way of going about that.”

“I dunno. Didn’t you have fun, just now?”

Kiyoomi pulls the knife away, takes out his sanitizer to spritz the surface of the Night Fox’s mask, then smacks the Night Fox on the forehead of his stupid fox mask.

In a minute it is the Night Fox who is handcuffed to the towel bar as he explains the plight of Suna, Hirugami’s-hacker-turned-FBI-informant, and the love of his life, Osamu, who had been born to two legendary thieves but escaped from a life of crime as soon as it had been possible to do so. It’s a good story. He’ll have to check with Komori right away about this Suna. The Night Fox directs Kiyoomi to take an encrypted drive from his pocket, where he finds files that show Hirugami is, indeed, keeping tabs on a man named Miya Osamu.

“What does any of this have to do with you?” Kiyoomi asks.

“Why don’t ya take off the mask and find out, Special Agent Sakusa?”

Kiyoomi moves to do so. When he puts the mask down on the table, the face of Miya Osamu is looking back at him. The only difference is the dyed blonde hair.

Osamu’s twin smiles crookedly at him. “Pleased to meet ya. Name’s Atsumu, but I go by the Night Fox, professionally. I’m willin’ to work with you to bring down Hirugami Fukuro, ‘cause that’s the only way my brother will ever be safe. On the condition you’ll get yourself transferred to the case, ‘course. I only want Omi-kun handlin’ me.”

Kiyoomi grimaces at the wording.

“That trick with the handcuffs was hot, by the way. I’m _cuffed_ to be workin’ with ya! Ha ha, geddit? Cuffed? Chuffed?” tries Atsumu, glancing down to the silver restraints around his own wrists. Kiyoomi doesn’t dignify this with a response beyond a single hateful look. “And ya wear gloves in yer own home? Kinky. I can tell we’re gonna have a lot of fun.”

When Kiyoomi sprays his face with sanitizer again, Atsumu howls. It probably got in his eyes. Kiyoomi tunes out the spout of profanity directed at him to call Komori.

The story checks out. Kiyoomi mutters angrily at Komori until the latter yawns and hangs up on him, leaving him with Atsumu, who takes the opportunity to curse him out again the moment Kiyoomi looks his way.

* * *

From what Atsumu has gleaned of Hirugami’s movements, if Sakusa and Komori had started moving when Atsumu sent his last message before being found out, they were left with two choices: go for Osamu first, or go for Atsumu. Years of perfecting a trade that sometimes pushed him to live without clocks means Atsumu has an excellent innate sense of time, even though it has been distorted by the pain in every part of his body. Judging from what Hirugami’s put him through, Sakusa and Komori have decided to save Osamu.

Good. So Osamu will win this one, after all. Atsumu’s gonna let him.

Now the rough flooring tears at Atsumu’s cheek as one of Hirugami’s goons drags him out of his cell. If there’s no rib piercing his lung then Atsumu sure as hell feels the phantom pain of it, feels the blood leak from the vessels inside his body as surely as it paints the path the goon walks, hears the tick of a clock counting down with a beat that grows fainter and more sluggish with time. 

“Not so cocky now, are you, now you’ve fallen out of favor with the boss man,” the goon gloats. The haze of pain is so thick that Atsumu doesn’t know what language he’s speaking, only able to understand the words and the growl that underlines them. 

Atsumu would argue the point, if he were in a better state. They’d sent two batches of three people before Hirugami decided to oversee Atsumu’s punishment personally, and Atsumu had sent them back bloody enough to stun a midwife. Of course he’s exhausted after two fights and a session of finger-slitting. Any numbskull would know enough not to gloat about his silence.

There are six of them this time. Finally, finally, they untie him. It is the first time they do. He pushes himself to his feet as his muscles scream for him to fall back down, and the moment he finds his gaze level with theirs the first one lunges at him, his foot like a projectile against Atsumu’s stomach. 

For a second he gets to register the metallic taste in his mouth and then they are on him, blow on blow on blow on blow until there is nothing in the world but pain. The light of a single bulb is blocked out by their shadows, even as Atsumu’s vision flickers; and then one blinks out, followed by another—he hears the sounds, faintly; sees the other shadows turning to attention; there is a glowing white circle swaying above Atsumu which flares red with every ragged breath he manages. 

He lets his head fall sideways. 

There is a demon on the loose. Atsumu knows him. Atsumu has fought him more than once. 

Each flash of the knife is followed by an arc of spurting redness, until he can no longer tell which of the splatters on the floor are his. Sakusa hooks a blade into the back of one man’s throat and flings him across the room, so he falls next to Atsumu, convulsing, eyes bulging, the little blood vessels in them straining at the edges. One cowers in the corner.

“Please, I… I will tell you anything! Anything you wish, I will give… please do not,” he manages, before Sakusa hoists him up by the collar and slams him into the wall thrice, bam bam bam, like the end of a song, and then Atsumu’s eyes are barely open when the knife comes out and Sakusa swings it into the man’s stomach and drags upwards, cloth and flesh parting as the man howls like Atsumu had done. Atsumu would retch, but the darkness is claiming him, and Sakusa is crouched in front of him, ripping the mask off his face. His face is completely clean. Of course it’s clean. The rest of him is still entirely covered in protective gear. Atsumu makes no move to reach for him, keenly aware of the grimy floor he’s been on.

“Ya didn’t have ta do that,” he croaks out.

“Shut up,” Sakusa says. His voice is trembling. The look on his face tells Atsumu it’s from fury, not fear. 

“Osamu.” Atsumu is foisted off the ground as Sakusa lifts him, getting Atsumu’s blood and god knows what else all over his clothes. There’s another pair of hands there helping Sakusa hold him up—Komori, presumably, still wearing _his_ mask. “Did ya get Osamu? An’ Suna?”

“They’re safe. In better shape than you.”

“I did this,” Atsumu forces himself to say. Just a little more. His mind switches between the image of the shaking hallway before him and Sakusa at his desk, staring at his own hands. “Not you.” The world dims. Sakusa says something to him, but Atsumu doesn’t catch it.

* * *

They foil a bombing with Atsumu’s help and get commended for it. They prevent an assassination. They expose a mole. The information he has is helpful, certainly, but what pisses Kiyoomi off more than anything is that it’s not even the most helpful thing Atsumu does for them. If Kiyoomi had sharpened his own instincts against the whetstone of Atsumu’s schemes in the past, now he gets to have his keen analytical mind on his side. Watching the cogs in Atsumu’s head turn as he stares at an information board Kiyoomi and Komori have put together is strangely thrilling.

He is about as good at balancing and eliminating possibilities as Kiyoomi is. And, frustratingly, he is even better at knowing what makes people tick.

When it’s just the two of them alone, Kiyoomi thinks everything Atsumu does is part of that—he is simply trying to figure Kiyoomi out with the poking, the prodding, the needling. Sometimes he thinks he doesn’t want that to be it. He wants Atsumu to be here, asking these questions, not because he’s trying to make a blueprint in his mind like he would do for a safe he’s trying to crack.

“Yanno, for a guy who asked to be assigned to me, ya seem to complain about it an awful lot,” Atsumu comments after Kiyoomi finishes grumbling about one of the heists Atsumu had pulled off in the location they’re currently pinning down as the next site of Hirugami’s operations. “I mean, I was so nice to you, Omi-kun! What gives?”

“Have you ever listened to yourself?” Atsumu shrugs. Kiyoomi scoffs. “There’s your answer.”

“Ouch, Omi-omi! That stings. Yer like a ray. With the sting.”

Kiyoomi sighs.

“How did you know I asked to be assigned to your case?”

“Asked Komori.”

Why would you do that, Kiyoomi thinks. Does he really want Atsumu to answer that? How would he even gauge the honesty of his response?

“Why’d ya want to handle me, Special Agent Sakusa? It’s not like you were savin’ lives, or anything. The case was basically just a matter of guardin’ wealth.”

“So you think I’m a noble person, now,” Kiyoomi mutters, almost amused. He looks at Atsumu, who says nothing. He just looks back. The afternoon light comes in through the window of Kiyoomi’s window, filling Atsumu’s irises with gold, and Kiyoomi has to turn his gaze back to the files he’s holding. “Before I asked for the Night Fox assignment, my cases were typical. Like Komori’s.”

“What, and one traumatized you?”

“No,” Kiyoomi says, putting down the files so he can look at his hands. The more cases he’d solved, the more wrong the world seemed. Like someone had been going out of their way to tilt everything just a few degrees every time he slept, or to put pores on all surfaces that exist so they oozed the rot they hid beneath whenever Kiyoomi touched them. When he removes the gloves, he sees the rot settling all over his hands. It flashes red. It dries black. “Nothing like that.”

Atsumu takes the files he’s just put down then goes through them with such speed that Kiyoomi can tell he doesn’t really read them.

“Yanno why I chose to be a thief, Omi-omi?” He puts down the files in front of him again, done using them as a prop for whatever that gesture was supposed to be, and fits his bare palm against Kiyoomi’s clothed one. Kiyoomi flinches but doesn’t move his hand away. Atsumu is looking at their pressed-together hands, not at Kiyoomi’s face. “‘Cause with my parents’ history, there ain’t a lot of ways to go but down. ‘Samu’s special. He managed to go up. But you know what I told him when he went and set up his thing? That one day I’d have a palace full of golden eggs and diamonds, and I’d laugh at him from my Ming dynasty chair. He said, fine, I’ll laugh at you from the house I won’t have to hide from anyone. Fuck that guy, huh?”

Miya Osamu runs a wildly popular seafood chain. He’s still the head chef of the oldest branch. Of the three of them, Kiyoomi might hazard that he’s the one who actually gets literal blood on his hands most often.

“He’s right,” Kiyoomi says, and Atsumu takes his hand away to push his hair out of his face, still not looking Kiyoomi in the eye.

“I know he’s right. That’s why I’m so mad.”

That night, Kiyoomi sits at his table long after Atsumu has retreated into the guest room with the electronic locks and surveillance cameras. The lights are off but the city outside is bright enough that Kiyoomi can still see his hands clearly. 

There’s a long line crossing each of his palms some people call the ‘fate line’, if his memories of Komori’s tarot and palm readings phase aren’t false. It runs deep and straight on each hand—some people would call this a good omen. To Kiyoomi it had just been two more places for the stains to get stuck in.

The gloves lie still on the table. If, this afternoon, Atsumu had taken one off before pushing his palm against Kiyoomi’s, would he have started to bleed? His skin smolders in every place Atsumu had pressed against. Atsumu didn’t even touch him, and still Kiyoomi burns.

* * *

Ginjima Hikaru lives in a cottage that’s near enough to the sea that the first thing he hears when he wakes up is the steady rhythm of the waves crashing on the shore. His next door neighbor is his twin, Haruki, who lives with his fiancé, Kita Yashamaru. Yashamaru used to work in IT—he was a software engineer, you know, in one of those start-ups with the beanbag chairs and casual dress code. Haruki and Yashamaru have decided to set up a catering service away from the hustle and bustle of the city. Their regular clients are the ladies’ book club, the nursing home, and parents looking to hold birthday parties at home. Occasionally, they serve weddings.

Hikaru runs a jewelry appraisal service. His documents are forged. His skills are not. Every week he reports to Marshal Bokuto, the jovial man who takes care of his case. When visitors ask about his life before he moved to this seaside town, or the scar on his face, Hikaru laughs and mentions a past of juvenile delinquency he’d like to leave behind. Just minor stuff, things like spray painting walls, setting off firecrackers in parks. Yeah, a firecracker had something to do with the scar. Nope, he’s not going to tell you the story. Let him take a look at that, here, so you can be on your way. Don’t you have errands to run?

Life goes on like that.

On Sundays like today, Hikaru reads the paper while sipping a cup of coffee. The coffee is necessary for him to have anything resembling a regular day because he usually stays up on Saturday nights. He checks the locks. He startles a bit at every noise that seems out of place, and doesn’t turn on music to tune things out. He waits for the dawn and gets a little hungrier every hour. He’s not as good a cook as Haruki, but since Haruki refuses to cook for him every day, he knows how to do some basic things. Today he’s making banana pancakes. He’s sliding one off the pan and onto his plate when he hears the knocking on the door.

The line between paranoia and survival instinct is more blurry for him than most. Hikaru looks through the peephole, keeping his body angled as far away from the door as possible in case whoever it is starts shooting.

The man in front of his door has dark curly hair and even darker eyes. His hands are in his pockets. Atsumu’s heart clenches when he realizes he’s remembered the location of the two moles on the man’s forehead correctly, all this time. He’s forgotten the details of the van Gogh, of the Persian jar, the diamond necklace that weighs as much as a healthy baby.

“Fancy seein’ ya here,” he says as he leans against the doorframe once he opens the door. Sakusa says nothing, so Atsumu fills in the silence. “Been a while, huh? Ya should come in. I’ll make ya some coffee and we can catch up. Bet you’ve been solvin’ cases left and right without me around to buzz in your ear.”

Sakusa inhales sharply, then takes one of his hands out of his pocket. He reaches for the hand Atsumu isn’t using to hold himself up. Atsumu straightens up. His other hand goes to the gloved hand that is holding his own, circles his wrist. He looks up. Sakusa’s looking at him with the kind of laser focus he usually reserves for his files. Atsumu pinches the end of one finger and tugs gently. The glove slides off without the kind of resistance Atsumu always thought he’d face.

So. This is Sakusa Kiyoomi’s right hand.

Atsumu had imagined this many times, before the seaside cottage and Hikaru and the catering service next door. Most of them involved taking the glove off with his teeth. Now that he can feel every faint scar criss-crossing Sakusa’s palms, see the faint flush around his knuckles and the joints of his fingers, Atsumu’s at a loss for what to do next. His thoughts race a million miles per second, but Sakusa’s ahead of him, raising his now-bare hand to trace the scar just below Atsumu’s eye with his thumb. Atsumu feels the slight dampness of sweat go cold against his skin as the wind wicks each minuscule drop away.

“I watched them put Hirugami behind bars yesterday,” Sakusa says, quieter than the breeze over the coast. “They put him in maximum security. He’ll be serving three life sentences, back-to-back.”

Then Sakusa’s left hand, still gloved, comes up to cup the other side of his face. 

Atsumu knows what’s going to happen next. So before that, he turns a little, fits his lips against Sakusa’s right palm, and kisses the middle of the line that runs from Sakusa’s wrist to the base of his middle finger. Sakusa’s eyes are still so dark. The ocean roars.

Then—though for the longest time it hadn’t seemed like this would turn out to be the case—the inevitable happens, as Sakusa tips his hand so Atsumu faces him head on, then closes the gap. Even the waves fall into a hush. By the sea, there is a conflagration, leaving the ashes to rest where they should.

**Author's Note:**

> so this is what it looks like when you want to have all the drama moments and do none of the actual work of coming up with a plot. haha!
> 
> also am weirdly pleased about making Sakusa go 'you're a barbarian' in my day 2 fic when Atsumu wanted to kiss him on the doorstop and now he is here. Kissing Atsumu. On the doorstep. Whoops


End file.
